"Don't think anything _about_ it," said the doctor. "Don't want to _hear_ anything about it. Have no patience with any woman who'd let a husband sell a farm at such a sacrifice as Harry's was sold, merely because there was a remote chance she would become insane if she staid there. Now, I've enough to do--plenty to do, but, still, I was willing to superintend that farm a little, as my doing so was such a help to Harry. Well, well; they'll both go to the dogs, that's the amount of it. A rolling stone gathers no moss. Harry was good for something before he married Ruth; had a mind of his own. Ruth aint the wife for him." "He did not appear to think so," replied the obstinate Mrs. Jones. "Everybody in the village says, 'what a happy couple they are.'" "_O-o-h_--my!" hissed the old lady, "did you _ever_, doctor? Of course, Mrs. Jones, you don't suppose Harry would be such a fool as to tell people how miserable he was; but _mothers_, Mrs. Jones, _mothers_ are keen-sighted; can't throw dust in a _mother's_ eyes." "_Nor in mine_," retorted the independent Mrs. Jones, with a mock courtesy to the old lady, as she walked out the door, muttering as she went down the road, "Sally Jones will tell her the truth if nobody else will." "Mis. Hall," said the doctor, drawing himself up so straight as to snap off his waist-band button, "this is the last time that woman ever crosses _my_ threshold. I shall tell Deacon Smith that I consider her a proper subject for church discipline; she's what the bible calls 'a busy body in other men's matters;' a character which both you and I despise and abominate, Mis. Hall." CHAPTER XXIV. The _first-born_! Oh, other tiny feet may trip lightly at the hearth-stone; other rosy faces may greet us round the board; with tender love we soothe their childish pains and share their childish sports; but "Benjamin is not," is written in the secret chamber of many a bereaved mother's heart, where never more the echo of a childish voice may ring out such liquid music as death hath hushed. Spring had garlanded the earth with flowers, and Autumn had withered them with his frosty breath. Many a Summer's sun, and many a Winter's snow, had rested on Daisy's grave, since the date of our last chapter. At the window of a large hotel in one of those seaport towns, the resort alike of the invalid and pleasure-seeker, sat Ruth; the fresh sea-breeze lifting her hair from temples thinner and paler than of yore, but stamped with a holier beauty. From the window might be seen the blue waters of the bay leaping to the bright sunlight; while many a vessel outward and inward bound, spread its sails, like some joyous white-winged sea bird. But Ruth was not thinking of the sapphire sky, though it were passing fair; nor of the blue sea, decked with its snowy sails; for in her lap lay a little half-worn shoe, with the impress of a tiny foot, upon which her tears were falling fast.